Why did HaShem create twins (Yaakov and Esuv) if he could just create one righteous person who would be Yaakov with the good traits of Esuv? I know Esuv was supposed to support Yaakov, but Yaakov didn't need support so long as he followed the path of HaShem. We see that even when Esuv was hunting him, he somehow became rich with food and gold.

5 Answers
5

Another Kabbalistic idea is that Eisav and Yaakov represent, respectively, the spiritual worlds of Tohu ("chaos") and Tikkun ("correction"). A presentation of this idea is here. A couple of key paragraphs:

Esau is the raw, untamed energy of
Tohu. He is a destructive force,
because he lacks the discipline and
control that would channel this energy
in a useful, constructive way. But he
is also a very powerful force -- far
more powerful than the constricted and
defined energies that animate Jacob's
correct and orderly world. The
challenge, as we said, is to bring
together the cosmic twins in a way
that exploits the best of both worlds:
to marry the immense energy of Tohu
with the focus and control of Tikkun.

...

So the quest to unite Tohu and Tikkun
extends beyond their lifetimes, to the
nations of Israel and Edom. The eight
kings which "reigned in Edom, before
there reigned any king over the
children of Israel," are the volatile
forces of Tohu, while the people of
Israel proceed to Sinai where they are
entrusted with the 613 commandments
that serve as the vessels for tikkun
olam, the correction and civilization
of the world. The conflict rages on in
the battles between Judah and Rome,
between spirit and matter, between law
and lust, to be resolved only when the
struggles of humanity culminate in the
day when "the saviors shall ascend
Mount Zion to judge the mountain of
Esau."

The Zohar in Breishis says the reason all the avos until Yaacov had one good and one bad child is because after the sin in Gan Eden of eating from the tree of knowledge, the zuhamah (spiritual taint) was still in them. So in order to remove it there had to be a bad child for each until Yaacov who had all 12 good children.

He was the klipa before the pri (the shell before the fruit). It says that first comes the klippa, then comes the person who mevarers the shell and reveleals the fruit (sort of like "Mah" mevarers "Ban" which originally came from "Sag" and gets put into "Ab")

I always felt the reason the Avos had Yishmael, Aisav, brothers fighting, story of Dinah, etc. was to give us Chizuk. When a parent has a child that is at risk, children fighting or not talking to each other, or any other tragedy it gives them Chizuk when they can look back at the Avos HaKedoshim and see it happens even to the best parents.

On Shabbos, I saw from Rabbi Dovid Feinstein that Yishmael was "beautiful" but he decided to become wicked. We all have the power to be good and the power to be bad. Its what we choice that will make us into who we become.
–
d aOct 17 '10 at 18:30